A Quarter of Learners Say the Cost-of-Living Crisis Has Negatively Impacted Their Ability to Attend Education, One in Five Say Poor Connectivity Has Cost Them Marks or Deadlines
The Invigilator, the global remote-assessment platform used by nearly one million students worldwide each year, today releases The Education Equality Index 2026. The inaugural index is a new UK-wide dataset examining how learners experience education and assessment under real-world constraints.
Key findings include:
20% of learners say poor connectivity has already caused them to lose marks, miss deadlines or fail an assessment
25% say where they live or lived has directly limited the quality of education available to them
26% say the cost-of-living crisis has negatively impacted their ability to attend education in person
27% say the cost or distance of travel ruled out courses or institutions they wanted to apply for
41% struggle to balance studying alongside holding down a job
36% say they perform worse in traditional in-person exams because they find them stressful or overwhelming
Based on a nationally representative survey spanning school-age learners, further education, higher education and adult learners, the research provides a rare end-to-end view of how geography, cost pressures and infrastructure shape access to learning, consistency of participation and assessment outcomes across the education system. The Invigilator supports a range of assessment types globally, including continuous, formative and summative assessments, across schools, colleges, universities and professional awarding bodies, with its proprietary assessment technology designed to function under real-world conditions such as low bandwidth, uneven device access and disrupted connectivity. The findings reflect pressures already being navigated at scale across the UK education system.
Cost and Travel Are Actively Narrowing Participation
Affordability is no longer a background pressure but a direct barrier to participation. More than a quarter of learners say the cost-of-living crisis has reduced their ability to attend education in person, reinforcing the extent to which education is now shaped by household economics as well as academic choice. As a result, more learners are studying online, often by necessity rather than preference. However, the data suggests that assessment conditions and proctoring requirements can still create barriers, particularly where exams assume constant connectivity, high-spec devices or sustained data usage.
Travel compounds that pressure. More than one in four learners say the cost or distance of travelling ruled out courses or institutions they wanted to apply for, rising sharply in major urban regions and areas with limited local provision.
Time and work-based demands are similarly structural rather than occasional. 41% of learners struggle to balance study alongside paid work, reflecting the reality that education is increasingly being fitted around employment rather than treated as a full-time pursuit.
Alarmingly, socio-economic differences are evident. Learners from lower income households are more likely to report having reduced, paused or left education due to caring responsibilities, with learners twice as likely as those from higher income households to say they left education entirely. The data clearly suggests that cost and time pressures are more likely to force withdrawal among those with fewer resources to counter disruption.
Connectivity and Location Remains a Structural Divider
A quarter of learners say geography has directly constrained the quality of education available to them, with agreement highest among working-age adults rather than school pupils. Around 29–30% of those aged 25–44 report location-based limitation, suggesting long-standing structural effects rather than short-term disruption.
Connectivity has emerged as a parallel fault line. One in five learners nationally say poor connectivity has already affected assessment outcomes, with disruption unevenly distributed across regions. The share of learners saying poor connectivity has cost them marks, deadlines or an assessment result is highest in the North West (33%), Northern Ireland (32%) and Eastern England (30%). By contrast, reported disruption is lowest in the South West (12%), Wales (11%) and Yorkshire and Humberside (13%). The findings underline how assessment remains particularly sensitive to infrastructure quality, even as learning itself becomes more flexible. Perpetuating the findings further, learners in lower social grades are more likely to report that such constraints have disrupted their education.
Assessment Conditions Are Influencing Outcomes
Beyond attendance, assessment formats themselves are shaping performance. More than a third of learners say they perform worse in traditional in-person exams because they find them stressful or overwhelming, rising to nearly half of 18–24 year olds. Nearly one in three learners say they would have performed better if allowed to study or complete exams from home, increasing to almost half among 16–17 year olds. The findings point to a growing mismatch between how learning now operates and how assessment is still commonly delivered. Full data set available upon request.
AI, Assessment and Readiness for the Future Workplace
Fewer than four in ten learners say their institution actively allows or encourages the responsible use of AI during assessments, while a quarter say they feel unprepared for the future workplace because they have not been taught how to use AI properly. Together, the data suggests that assessment conditions, guidance and learner realities are increasingly misaligned; primary observations underpinning The Invigilator’s AI detection model built to ensure exam integrity. The proprietary technology utilised across nearly a million students worldwide includes identity verification and the flagging of irregular behaviour, while enabling institutions to set clearer boundaries around acceptable and unacceptable use. The findings highlight growing pressure on assessment systems to balance trust, oversight and learner readiness in an AI-enabled environment.
Nic Riemer, CEO, The Invigilator Comments:
“As education becomes increasingly hybrid, the evidence shows that access is shaped by a combination of factors, including geography, connectivity, affordability, time pressures and the realities of daily life. Many learners are navigating study alongside work, caring responsibilities or limited local provision, and those constraints continue to influence who can participate consistently and on equal terms.
Within that wider context, assessment has emerged as the key bottleneck. Learners may be able to access teaching remotely, yet exams still rely on physical attendance, stable infrastructure and assumptions about device access that do not reflect how people actually live or learn. Invigilator supports continuous, formative and summative assessments across schools, colleges, universities and professional bodies, with assessment models designed to operate under real-world conditions, including low bandwidth, uneven device access and disrupted connectivity. As artificial intelligence becomes embedded in learning, assessment systems also need trusted ways to verify identity, maintain integrity and set clear boundaries around acceptable use. The policy task now is to ensure assessment is inclusive, resilient and credible at scale, so geography and circumstance do not continue to determine educational outcomes.”
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